


Trust

by SailorSol



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Families of Choice, Family, Feels, Friendship, Gen, Kirk Feels, Movie Spoilers, Trust
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-20
Updated: 2013-05-20
Packaged: 2017-12-12 09:25:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 848
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/809986
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SailorSol/pseuds/SailorSol
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jim's mother offers him some much needed advice in the wake of the movie.</p>
<p>(ST:ID spoilers.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Trust

**Author's Note:**

> All the feels. Some feels I didn't even know I had until I started writing this.
> 
> And, uh, yeah... I'm in the camp that Winona was not a bad mother, even if maybe she wasn't always around. So there's that...

The second time he wakes up, his mother is sitting in a chair next to him, her head resting on the bed. Her face is turned towards his, eyes closed. He can see the tear stains on her cheeks, and he reaches out to brush them lightly with his thumb. She blinks her eyes open, then jolts upright.

"You're awake!" she says, and Jim can't help the small smile that tugs at his lips.

"You are too."

His mother scowls at him. "You have a terrible sense of humor, James Tiberius Kirk."

That makes his grin grow wider, but it fades after a quick moment. She looks tired, worn around the edges, and he knows it's because of him. "Bones told you everything, I take it?"

She nods, taking his hand into hers. It's warm, comforting. She wasn't around much when he had been growing up, but she had always been physically affectionate when she was. It makes him feel like a kid again, home with the flu. "Yes. I saw on the news about Christopher, too." She says the last part slowly, gently, and yet Jim can't stop himself from flinching anyway.

He looks down at their hands, unable to look at his mother, to see the sympathy on her face. She'd met Christopher Pike a handful of times; some even before Jim had, when Pike had been a young cadet writing his honors thesis on the day Jim was born. She knew how much the older man meant to Jim. But in all the chaos, Jim had almost— _almost_ —managed to forget what had happened, to pretend that it had been a bad dream or that Bones would have worked his miracles on the admiral too. But Jim was the only one who got the benefit of the doctor's particular brand of magic.

"He was supposed to be in command, Mom," Jim admitted softly. Spock was the only other person on the crew who knew that. "They were going to send me back to the Academy, but he fought with Admiral Marcus—" and that name is thick in his mouth, now, "—he was going to be in command and I was going to be his first officer."

It had hurt, so much, being told they were taking his ship away. Jim loved the _Enterprise_ , it was his home, and having it taken away was like having part of his family ripped away from him. And then Pike had offered him a second (third?) chance, and more than that, Pike had offered Jim a chance to _learn_ from him. There was so much Jim could have learned, but now that chance was gone.

"Oh Jim," she says softly, and she shifts to sit on the edge of his bed, wrapping him into a hug. He buries his face against her neck and lets himself cry.

It's not just for Pike, though that's why Jim starts crying. But they lost a lot of good people in the last month; Jim's not even sure how many yet, or who, because Bones and Spock have ganged up against him and won't tell him. He wants to know—needs to know, so he can inform their families, because he's their captain and that's his responsibility.

He cries because Admiral Marcus had been a good man, once, until something had gone wrong with him, and Jim worries that maybe someday he'll end up in that position too. _It was a good fight_ , Jim had said, and Pike had replied with _maybe that's your problem_. Maybe that had been Admiral Marcus' problem, too.

He cries too because, despite everything, Khan cared about his crew, his _family_ , as much as Kirk does. And maybe Kirk wouldn't attack Starfleet the way Khan had, but maybe he would, if they didn't give him any choice, and that scares him. He knows that his moral compass is skewed sometimes, and if Bones and Spock and Uhura, Scotty and Sulu and Chekhov, and all of the others were taken away from him, Jim isn't sure he wouldn't follow the same path that Khan did.

"I don't know what I'm doing, Mom," he says, and his voice cracks. He had died for his crew, and he's still not sure how to keep them safe, how to lead them, and Pike could have taught him, but he's gone now too.

"You don't have to know," she says softly, rubbing his back. "You just have to trust your friends, trust yourself to listen to their guidance. No one person has all the answers, Jim."

"And if I lose them?" he asks, even though the words hurt to say out loud. "We won't all be on the _Enterprise_ together forever."

"Then remember what you've learned from them, and trust in that," she says. She shifts, and tilts his chin up so his eyes meet hers. "You never met your father, but you learned from him, didn't you?"

He snorts softly, not quite a laugh. "Yeah, I suppose I did."

"You'll be okay. Your friends will make sure of that."

He believes her.


End file.
